Joy Reid: Republicans Brought This On By Ignoring Conservatives, And Immigration Was Deal-Breaker

JOY REID: There really is this sense, as Bruce Bartlett told me, that for 30 or 40 years you've had the elites of the Republican party amass a large enough coalition to pass the things that the elites wanted. Namely low taxes for themselves and deregulation for their businesses. And they assembled a large enough coalition by essentially ceding blue collared white voters everything from evangelicalism and supporting them in terms of their religious faith and promising them that they would legislate around that. Promising them that they would legislate around social issues that were important to them. Promising them that they would beat back the creeping liberalizing of the culture.

By feeding them even with their deep down gut feelings that there was something really inherently wrong with Barack Obama. To be able to hold that together with the help of the entertainment complex that is part of the conservative movement, with the help of movement conservatives. Immigration is where the bargain just broke down. And that base, the base of the party is no longer willing to go along with any part of the elite. Not the movement conservatives. Not the money elite part of the party. They're just not willing to go along with it. Immigration was the deal-breaker and they are gone. They cannot be brought back into the tent. Not even by the mighty National Review. None of the people who are going to Trump are going to read that. They are not going to listen to those people. They are not listening.